Surgery
The few people who appeared for breakfast enjoyed their meal silently. Clint let his gaze wander across the room. Thor was quietly chatting with T’Challa while emptying his third bowl of cereal whereupon Peter looked at him in disbelief.
A visibly nervous Steve sat next to him and Clint was the last one to blame him. Bucky had told him he needed a moment on his own and beyond that he wasn’t allowed to eat something anyway. So, with a heavy heart, Clint had left him back in their apartment and went to the dining room already knowing he wouldn’t be able to take a single bite of his toast. Same went for Steve.
“He called Nat this morning” Clint told him.
Steve didn’t look surprised and encountered him with a gesture to go on.
“She’s somewhere stuck in Siberia on a mission from Fury… god I can’t remember having heard her so worried. Though she tried to hide it of course.”
Steve rubbed the knuckles of his hands.
“Well, I have. As you lost your hearing, she wouldn’t leave your side when you were tied to the bed. She slept on the most miserable hospital banks or even on the floor next to your bed just to be with you. Her loyalty is ironclad.”
“Well, guess we’re both becoming Natasha’s then…” Clint murmured.
“It will go fine” Steve said, trying to maintain some of his leading Captain America voice to calm Clint down. But Clint was well aware that this statement was a mantra they both recited mechanically in their heads.
***
“You look ravishing!” Loki smirked and teasingly kissed Stephen on the mouth just before he was able to put his surgical mask on. The sparkling that lightened his lover’s eyes for just a moment made Loki shiver.
“Guys c’mon! We’re about to perform an important surgery here! …Jesus, can anyone help me with these gloves?” Tony, under Shuri’s assistance, struggled his way into his surgery gown.
“Thanks Loki, now you contaminated my whole gown and I can re-do the whole procedure again!” Stephen grumbled but Loki knew he wasn’t actually mad. In fact since Stephen was a former star surgeon he was so used to this routine of putting on the entire gown that he was done the second time before the others were even finished.
Covered in face masks, gowns, gloves and hair caps they stepped out into the surgery room.
“Let Steve and Clint bring him in” Wanda suggested and everyone nodded in agreement.
***
When Clint came back into their apartment Bucky sat on the bed already on his surgery clothing, one knee bobbing up and down very fast. He had shaved his beard and his hair was loosely bound into a bun. Bucky looked up as Clint entered, trembling heavily as he tried to stand up straight.
“Clint, can you hold me? Just hold me?” he whispered.
Clint caught him in his big arms and pulled him into a warm hug. Bucky sighed and buried his face in the crook of Clint’s neck. The touch and the smell of his now fiancée was calming him, soothing him. Clint slowly let one hand run over Bucky’s back whispering: “You are doing so great, baby. It’s gonna be alright. I’ll be there when you wake up, I promise you that. You will be safe. You are safe – with me.”
He gently tilted up Bucky’s head so he could look him in the eyes.
“I love you. More than I could ever express with words. So I thought when you pass out, you rather think of this-“
And then he kissed Bucky in a loving and caring way Bucky had never been kissed before and he melted in Clint’s arms. Clint was right, Bucky thought, he would never forget about this moment, as Clint’s warm soft lips caught him from falling into a hole of dark thoughts and dragged him out of it. The kiss was tender but yet passionate and wet and the raw intimacy baffled both of them, despite having share so many kisses before.
With an almost pained sigh Bucky eventually pulled away as if it hurt him when he couldn’t taste these lips. Clint gently brushed a brown strand behind Bucky’s ear.
“I wanted us to have this moment for ourselves” Bucky murmured. “Not in front of all the others…”
“That’s good. Me neither” Clint softly smiled and was just about to kiss Bucky again, as they were interrupted by a gentle knock at the door. Light fear lightened Bucky’s eyes but Clint gently kissed him on the forehead before he opened the door.
Steve leaned in the door frame with a knowing look in his eyes as they fell onto the scenery.
“They’re ready now”
Bucky glanced on Clint’s watch.
“Damn it… and they’re even ten minutes too early.”
Steve sadly smiled and Bucky carefully squirmed himself out of Clints arms just to end up in Steve’s. They both shared a long intimate hug and whispered something to each other. Clint already had stepped out into the hallway therefore he the only thing he could hear was Steve finishing a sentence with “…taking all the stupid with you” whereupon they had to smile.
Steve led them into a small room where Bucky was asked by Stephen to lay down onto a doc-tor's couch so he could inject Bucky a anxiolytic medicament over an indwelling venous cannula.
“This is supposed to relief your anxiety before we actually start the surgery” Stephen told them while he fixed the cannula on the back of Bucky right hand. “The dosage is a little stronger than for usual people because a) – of course you have the serum in your system and b) – to prevent any possible panic attacks when you find yourself in this kind of medical environment after such a long time again.”
Bucky tightly squeezed Clint’s hand but yet the relief was visible on his face because indeed there had been some complications during the first surgery attempt in Wakanda.
Everyone including himself had underestimated what an impact it had on him to be back in a surgical environment that he subconsciously connected with being strapped on a bench in the Siberian facility and being experimented on by Zola. He had had a full blown panic attack including with some very unpleasant flashbacks that they had to postpone the surgery for a few days.
After around five minutes Bucky had stopped trembling and as another ten went by he was completely relaxed. He was placed into a wheelchair and Clint shoved him in front of the door of the surgery room.
Clint crouched down next to Bucky while Steve and Stephen politely fell into a conversation to give Bucky and Clint a moment on their own.
Bucky reached out to Clint and they shared a gentle kiss.
“See you on the other side, my love” Bucky whispered and squeezed Clints hand.
“I promise you, I’ll be there. And then we’re gonna have the most amazing wedding.” Clint smiled so tenderly that a welcoming and securing warmth spread across Bucky’s body, although he could not unsee that his fiancée’s eyes were wet by now.
“I love you!”
“I love you!” Clint said with a light quaver in his voice. Steve opened the door and Stephen gently turned Bucky in the wheelchair and shoved him into the surgery room.
Then the door closed.